Podcast: Don’t be so judgemental!

By Ana | Podcast Inglês Online

May 17
Inglês - Podcast Don’t be so judgemental!

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O podcast de hoje fala sobre palavras muito comuns no vocabulário americano: judge e judgemental; e também mostra duas expressões idiomáticas relacionadas.

Transcrição

Hey, how’s it going today? This is Ana Luiza with a new episode of the inglesonline podcast. To download or just listen to other episodes and download transcripts, go to inglesonline.com.br and click Podcast Inglesonline.

Today I wanna talk about a word that is so popular in the English language… If you’re a regular viewer of American movies, or TV series or sitcoms, you have most likely heard this word or one of its variations several times. I’m talking about the words judgement, judge, judgemental and so on. And I’m not referring to anything related to a courtroom. Nope, I’m gonna give you examples of how words like judgemental are used in everyday conversation among regular people.

So let me give you an example of what I mean: if Kevin is judging Anthony, that means that Kevin is disapproving of Anthony in some way. Anthony has done or said something that Kevin disapproves of. So Kevin is judging Anthony, which means that Kevin is thinking, or possibly saying something negative about Anthony. Kevin is saying that Anthony should not have done what he did. He’s saying that Anthony was weak (which is the opposite of strong), or he’s saying that Anthony was dishonest, or something like that. So Kevin is judging Anthony.

When you judge someone, it’s usually because they did or said something you consider wrong, or weak, or in poor taste, or something like that. In general, when we judge someone we are seeing this person as inferior in some way.

So let’s get on to some more vocabulary: let’s say you’re watching a movie and two characters are having a conversation. One of them says, Melissa gave up college. She’s working as a waitress now. And the other character says What? I can’t believe that. I thought she was a smart girl, but she isn’t! And then the first character says Hey, don’t be so judgemental! Don’t judge Melissa for quitting college. She can’t afford college right now and she’s got to help her family financially. So again, this is very common for people to say: Don’t be so judgemental, you shouldn’t judge her. And, of course, the word judgemental describes a person who judges. When someone judges someone else, the first person is being judgemental.

Sometimes you hear someone say Who are you to judge? Like, who do you think you are to judge? That means something like “do you think you’re perfect? Have you never made any mistakes?” Who are you to judge? Here’s an expression that goes well in this situation: Get off your high horse. “Get off your high horse” means “stop acting as if you were better than everyone else”, you know? Be more humble. Get off your high horse. So again, here goes the combination: Who are you to judge? Please get off your high horse.

And here’s a saying – it’s like a “ditado” in Portuguese: You can’t judge a book by its cover. You can’t judge a book by its cover. Did you get the meaning? The cover of the book has to do with its appearance, right? Perhaps the cover looks lame, but who knows? The interior of the book, you know, the story? The story might be good. So don’t judge a book by its cover. This saying can be used for anything, any situation for which you don’t have a lot of information, you’re just looking at the surface… Maybe it’s a person that you’re about to meet and you take a look at the person and your first impression isn’t a very good one. And then someone says to you “Give it time, get to know him, he’s great… Don’t judge a book by its cover”.

OK, so that’s it for today! So tell us your story in the comments: tell us about a time when you judged someone or someone judged you. Or when you judged a book by its cover, figuratively speaking, and then you were proven wrong. Talk to you next time!

 

Key expressions

  • don’t be so judgemental
  • don’t judge her
  • who are you to judge?
  • get off your high horse
  • don’t judge a book by its cover

 

Glossary

courtroom = tribunal

can’t afford = não tem como pagar por

lame = péssima

you were proven wrong = você viu (ou alguém mostrou) que você estava enganado

Ana
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Thaís 18/06/2011

How to be less judgemental: http://getitdone.quickanddirtytips.com/how-to-be-less-judgmental.aspx

Ana Luiza 27/05/2011

Hi Diana! You can say “misjudge” when you’ve judged someone and later realized you were wrong.

So you could say you and your friend misjudged each other.

Ana Luiza 27/05/2011

Hi, everyone! Love the comments… Keep it up wink

Magda 27/05/2011

Hey guys! As most of you said above all of us are kinda judgemental what is not good, because we can be wrong about one person or one situation and in real situation may be totally different of what we thought. Furthermore, judging the book by its cover isn’t also a good idea. We can lose great friendships just because that. But I gotta confess I still do it sometimes and I’ve been trying to control it.

Vera Graña Cruz 26/05/2011

Unfortunatelly our society judge a book usually by its cover and people are so judgmenatl. Let’s change it!

Camilo 24/05/2011

Yeah guys, it’s my weakness too, to judge people. It happened in my english course, where there is a guy who doesn’t stop to speak on the class, and it pissed me off. But after our last class he start a conversation with me and he was very friendly.

Igor 23/05/2011

What a funny thing! This saying happen to me a couple of days ago, when I had switched of department in my job. I was thinking very bad about my new boss, even before met her! Later, I discovered what a nice person she is.

Diana Pimenta 23/05/2011

When i was at school there was a guy that i was always judging by his different appearance .. till the day i met him personnaly!
And.. you know what?
Nowdays he is one of my best friends .. and the funniest thing is he was judging me too wrongly! ..we laugh about that too much everytime we remember we were being so stupid .. and now i really keep in my mind ” dont judge a book by its cover ” .. cause you can be wasting a great friendship for example..!!

Kiss from Portugalllll =)

and good luck to everyone!!

ELIO RICARDO 20/05/2011

muito bom receber essas dicas .
          parabenz e toda equipe
                abraços
                  ELIO

Ana Luiza 19/05/2011

Ricardo, na verdade as duas grafias são corretas.

Ricardo 19/05/2011

Caros,

Desculpem mas preciso fazer uma pequena correcao.

Escreve-se JudGMental.  Sem o ‘E’ entre o ‘G’ e o ‘M’.

Sorry!

Ricardo

Cassius Silva 19/05/2011

Hello guys,
That was the first podcast that i read and it was to me. I was very judgemental with my work partner, the first impression when i saw him was not good, couple days after this we become big friends.

Ana Luiza 18/05/2011

Hi everyone,

I agree, I’m judgemental too sometimes and it looks like everyone is at one point or another wink

Thanks for the compliments.. Glad to hear you guys are enjoying them!

Evandro 18/05/2011

Actually I think everybody it is a little judgemental, unfortunatelly, but as people said above, we are not perfect, so we have to survive with it and try to practice our mind.

As always, Ana Luiza has developed another great podcast.

I love your job Ana. Congrats.

Magda 18/05/2011

Another great podcast.

Claudia 18/05/2011

Oh Henrique you are not alone, I also make the same mistakes. We need to exercise our mind frequently.We are not perfect too.

Henrique 18/05/2011

Well, I have this bad habit of judging people that I don’t even know well. For this reason, I have come across lots of situations in which people turned out to be the opposite of what I had previously thought of them. In these cases, I always make a mental note: “Don’t be so judmental, bastard!”.

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